


Reality Will Break Your Heart

by Megalomaniacal



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: Divorce, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-17
Updated: 2017-10-17
Packaged: 2019-01-18 11:14:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12386949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Megalomaniacal/pseuds/Megalomaniacal
Summary: In which the gang didn't stick together after high school.





	Reality Will Break Your Heart

**Author's Note:**

> Okay this is literally 
> 
> I took 2 stories I wrote in SOPHOMORE YEAR so tHREE YEARS AGO and I mushed them together and just changed the names and pronouns bc I wanted to post SAD so this is probably HORRIBLE and I probably forgot to replace a lot of the original pronouns but that's okay 
> 
> I literally wrote this shit as a depressed (wow what's changed) 14 year old who had her heart stomped on so listen,,, it's not perfect

"So you showed up, huh? Can't pretend I'm not surprised. You always were in love with this place." Dennis spoke, voice dripping with sarcasm. 

"Love is a strong word. I wouldn't throw it around so lightly if I were you. Although, you always have." 

Mac turned his head and gave Dennis the same sneering grin he had given him just moments before. Dennis looked less than amused at his comment, taking note of the fact that he seemed to not have changed much since high school. He likely hadn't let go of most things he had told him either. 

For a moment Dennis was caught off guard as paused and looked away, swallowing slowly, a light pink blush on his cheeks. It déja vu, like the second half of senior year all over again. That was when it all started going downhill. Mac never knew what he could say to Dennis, afraid to lose him, wondering if he would care if he lost him. 

"I'm surprised you came," After what couldn't have more than a minute Dennis finally spoke with honesty, "How've you been? I'm sure things have changed since the summer before I left."

"... Yeah," Mac caught eye contact with him, holding it as he started talking again. "Yeah. A lot has changed. How about you? You're probably married, have kids, right?"

Any semblance of happiness left on Dennis's face melted away at his questions. "I wish."

"Did your teenage nightmares play out as expected?" He spoke without thinking of how Dennis may react. 

"Teenage nightmares?"

"Never mind."

"Oh no, please elaborate. I'm turning thirty nine in two months, I can't remember everything from back when I was eighteen." 

"Thirty nine. I haven't spoken to you in ten years, huh?" 

"What's my teenage nightmare?" Dennis's tone of voice grew colder with each word. 

"That you'd never get married. All your plans for your future would be crushed because no one would ever love you back. Or, as you put it, no one would be good enough for you. No wife, no kids, no one to raise or grow old with. No pretty wedding." Mac sighed, looking almost tired as he spoke, "Do you seriously not remember talking to me about that?"

"I talked to you about a lot of things." Dennis responded. "And then I didn't." 

He knew exactly what he was talking about. He wondered if Dennis had ever forgotten about the whole situation or if he thought about it often. Maybe it crossed Denni's mind every once in a while. If it did, Mac wondered if it hurt for Dennis to think of it. 

"You're right though." Dennis's voice interrupted his thoughts. "Many things did not turn out as I planned them. I did go to the college I wanted, I got the degree I wanted, I got a decent bar and some decent cash. My sister has kids, my two nephews and two nieces. They're wonderful and I see them at least twice a year. Not that you care. I don't know why I'm even talking with you again."

"Ouch." The conversation had lost any bits of joy that it may have held some time earlier. 

"I still don't know if I'm the one who started cutting you off or if it was you who started cutting me off." Mac paused after realizing what he had said. "No. Ignore that. It was you, you who stopped calling, you who stopped answering my calls. But don't start thinking you're too important to me. I rarely think about it anymore."

It was about as far from the truth as Mac could get. He had never stopped thinking about it. Dennis was the first person to change his idea of love. Dennis, who he had fallen for so hard that it was impossible to get back up, Dennis who never loved him back. That vicious cycle of events had ended up following Mac throughout his whole life. It wasn't just through adolescence. It happened in college, in his twenties, throughout his thirties. He had been engaged once to a woman who he didn't really love, just to try and prove he was straight. He finally thought everything would work out, life was finally on his side, and then he snapped, he told her without warning that he did not love her, and she took almost everything he had and left. 

As far as Mac was concerned, no one could deal with him. It didn't matter how much he loved them or how much it hurt. He was and never would be the type of person that people could fall in love with. He had come to terms with it many years ago. There was something wrong with him. Something in his head, maybe it showed in his face. He couldn't even love himself, and he was terrified of God's punishment for who he did love. 

"I'm sure." Dennis agreed, but the two words sounded more like a question. He never really thought about it anymore, so why would Mac? If Mac was still thinking about it, then he was a lot more like how he used to be than Dennis had thought. 

Mac took a deep breath before sighing and looking away once again. "Truth is, I was over it for a long time until my last relationship. It lasted two years and she pushed my buttons, dug up a lot of old roots, if you get what I'm trying to say." 

"Yeah."

Mac looked uncomfortable for another moment of silence before speaking. "How about you? You aren't married, but I'm sure you got at least a girlfriend. There were plenty of girls pining after you, right?" He grinned, but it was a weak expression. 

"Haha, no. No wife. I've been divorced, actually." 

"Oh, I'm sorry. When?"

"It was seven years ago, it's not a big deal. I've been in a few relationships before and after that one but... That one was tough. She was insane." 

"Isn't everyone."

"She took everything in the divorce. The house, money, even my son."

"You have a son?" 

"I had a son." Dennis corrected him. "My wife... Ex-wife... She told the court that I beat him, that I beat her, turned on the waterworks, said that he was too scared to talk about it in front of me. I haven't seen him in seven years. She- well, I'm still paying alimony payments to her."

The pain was visible on his face and Mac hesitated before pushing a little bit more. "How old was he?"

"He was four. He's turning eleven in August." Dennis sighed and ran a hand through his hair. Mac's eyes glazed over a rather large scar down the length of his wrist, one that had obviously been stitched up to avoid bleeding out. There was another scar on his upper arm that was showing just barely from underneath his shirt sleeve. It was light pink, the type that he could tell had faded quite a bit with time. He was surprised. It must have been really bad to push Dennis to physically harm himself. 

"Did you try to kill yourself?" Mac said softly. 

Green eyes met blue once again and Dennis could tell Mac wasn't just asking because he wanted to know as much as he could. Mac was genuinely concerned. 

"Yeah." It was one word, all he needed to answer the question. One word that told Mac more than a thousand words could have. 

"Don't do that again. My best friend killed himself a few years ago- well, you know. Charlie. He told me we couldn't be friends anymore, I went to his apartment later that night. I was the one who found him dead. I was questioned to all hell about it, too. Suspected for murder until they ran a few tests."

He opened his mouth to speak before shutting it. "She was horrible."

"Who? Your wife?"

"She was a liar. She took my son." 

"I'm sorry." 

"You don't have to say you're sorry for me. You've dealt with a lot."

"You've dealt with more." 

They stood in silence, maintaining eye contact for a few minutes before Mac spoke up. 

"Well, it was nice catching up." He nodded. 

"Yeah." Dennis held out his hand for Mac to shake. 

Mac hesitated for a moment, staring at his outstretched hand, his eyes moving up to the large scar and then looking him in the eyes once again. "I've missed you." His voice shook and he stepped a bit closer. "Can I just hug you? I know it's weird, but-"

"Yeah, it's fine. Go ahead." Dennis interrupted, watching as Mac hesitantly opened his arms and wrapped them around him. He didn't think twice before hugging Mac back, hearing him sigh deeply before he stepped away. 

"I missed you a lot." Mac seemed incredibly hesitant to speak but did anyways. He wasn't in high school anymore. If he blew it he wouldn't have to see him everyday, watching him talk and laugh with everyone else, drowning in thoughts of how he'd lost him as a friend. Mac had liked him as more than a friend, but it wasn't something he'd ever pursued. He had known Dennis would have never felt the same. 

They both knew it was too late to change anything now. 

Because life isn't how it is in stories; you don't meet the boyyou used to know and have a crazy drunk affair in a sleazy bar, you don't marry the girls you slept with in high school, you don't reunite with the rebellious teens who were in your high school friend group. You aren't going to somehow run into your first love in the crowd of a concert and suddenly fall in love all over again, because that's not how life works. Life is a story in its own right, but not that kind of story. You can't control the plot or dialogue or characters, because in real life those don't exist. You have chaos and people and conversations. You have emotions and loss and heartbreak. 

You have Mac remembering exactly how much he'd loved Dennis and exactly how he'd lost him. 

People don't just come back into your life just because they impacted it in the past. Sometimes you find people but it doesn't mean anything much. It's not a crazy coincidence, the universe telling you something was meant to be. People say you write your own story but you can't. There is no story to write. 

Even if the world was just one big story. Each person wrote out the events of their own life. No one would truly fall in love or develop hatred or experience burning, passionate lust for someone forbidden to them. There would be no chaos, no surprise, nothing spontaneous. And what fun would that be?

Dennis didn't know what love was. He never had. He thought he did, but he didn't. He hadn't felt anything real since he was fourteen. He expected life to be a story. It's not. He once heard his sister talk about how it had to be, how that passionate love in stories had to be real, how crazy coincidences and stolen kisses in the corner of the bar that lead to marriage and a life together must be real. She wanted that love so bad. The flaming, burning, passionate love. The kind of love that doesn't fade into comfort because it's always so burning and strong that it would be impossible to ignore. The type of love that aches in the best of ways, cannot be denied, cannot go unreturned. And thinking about it all left Mac with the simplest of questions:

Does love actually exist? 

They'd all read about the love that develops from insane lust or deep hatred. About crazy, wild sex that ends with gentle 'I love you's and reassurances that it's not just for the pleasure, that it's actually love. They'd all read about opposites attracting and enemies fighting until they get so tired and so exhausted of being angry with each other that they fall in love instead. 

But again, it's all stories. All stories and fantasies and insane hopes and dreams. You don't lose people in stories. They're always just a few pages away. 

Stories make everything seem romantic in every sense of the word. Sex, drugs, alcohol. They twist realities into the best thing possible. And so many people live through these stories, dissociate from reality in order to live in these semi-perfect worlds that are somehow better than the real ones. 

Dennis was one of those people. Drinking and convincing himself of his own glory to ignore his loneliness. 

Mac was one of those people, drinking till he passed out and forgot his problems each night. 

Sometimes, sometimes you just get so sick of dealing with your reality and yourself that you have to drown it out and dissociate from it, you have to put your life into these stories, take life from these stories. They're the only thing that lets you slip away into everything you could never achieve in real life. And then, in the end, you're left feeling oh so empty because none of it was real but you are; you are so, so, so real and you can't live your life through the stories that you make with alcohol and drugs clouding your mind anymore. 

But maybe you'll look up, and look at him, or her, and realize you want him to be in your story. You want a story that is different from your life right then, and you want that person in it. It doesn't matter if either of you fit into the story nicely. You know what you want and you think about it and silently plead for it to happen. 

But it doesn't. And that's how life is. It's not a story. 

Mac and Dennis didn't talk after that.


End file.
